Batya looked at her mother’s back, straight with determination, and registered her father’s joviality in the lightness of his steps. After her sisters’ disappointments, how could she put them through this anguish again, dashing their hopes?

Once inside, her father broke down crying. He hugged the waiting Reb Moskowitz. “My heart is so full of happiness and sadness that it runs over into my eyes.”

Batya’s thumb fingered a hangnail, its sharpness telling her this was real. She sneaked a look at her groom, this distinguished man standing in the middle of her sorry home. He had nothing in common with her or her world, even if he’d come from a shtetl. No! she wanted to shout. This is all one big mistake. Yet, like the inevitable shadow, the Divine had assigned her a groom. She had felt destined for great things as God’s daughter, and now her parents’ assent proved it. One thing was certain: life in America would be as wonderful as it was promised to be.

Her father turned to her. “While you are living in gravy, make sure you visit your uncle. Give him our blessings and ask him to write.” He rummaged among the pile of belongings still on the floor and fished out a yellowed envelope showing foreign words and stamps. “Here. Sew it into your dress.”

“Take my candlesticks,” her mother said, pushing the brass set into Batya’s hands.

“Keep them. She’ll get herself a gold set as soon as we reach Buenos Aires.” Reb Moskowitz’s fingers twirled the end of his moustache, and his diamond ring sparkled. “Gold there is like snow here.”

Surale hugged Batya, then handed her the rag doll. “Keep this so you’ll remember to find me a good husband, too.”

“You’re too young to think about that,” Batya murmured, and took the doll.

“Where I come from there are a hundred men to one woman,” Reb Moskowitz told Surale. “Your groom is already waiting for you.”

Batya’s mother wrapped a piece of cheese in gauze cloth. “For the road,” she said, and Batya, feeling dizzy, didn’t have the heart to refuse, even though she knew her mother needed the gauze to make more cheese.

Her father didn’t bother to wipe his face as he hugged Batya. “These are tears of joy. It’s your bright future that I see.”

She breathed in the sour dairy scent of his beard. A sob broke through her chest. She forced herself to suppress it; she was doing it for them all.

“Take care of my child,” her mother whispered to Reb Moskowitz.

“I will care for her as if she’s my daughter,” he replied. “Until she’s ready to marry me.”

“May God be with both of you.”

Chapter Seven